10 Totally Kind Things Social Conservatives Have Said About Gays

With Republican Party leaders pushing a plan for the GOP to broaden its appeal by softening its stance on social issues, a group of leading social conservatives sent a letter to RNC Chairman Reince Priebus promising an exodus from the party if it stops opposing gay marriage.

But in the letter, the signatories — who included Eagle Forum founder Phyllis Schlafly, former presidential candidate Gary Bauer, and Focus on the Family’s James Dobson — also expressed indignation that anyone would suggest they haven’t been nice to gays — or “homosexuals,” as they say.

“We deeply resent the insinuation that we have treated homosexuals unkindly personally,” they wrote.

So, of course, we had to dig through the archives to find some of the uniquely kind things these conservative activists have said about gays and lesbians over the years.Schlafly, who has a gay son, may believe she’s kind to homosexuals, but she doesn’t respect them. She made that clear in a 2010 interview where she outlined her opposition to gay marriage, something Schlafly and many of the others who signed the letter to Priebus have fought tooth and nail.

“Nobody’s stopping them from shacking up,” Schlafly said of lesbians and gays. “The problem is they are trying to make us respect them, and that’s an interference with what we believe.”

Another signatory of the letter, American Family Association President Tim Wildmon, took it a step further. Not only does he not respect gays, he doesn’t want them to respect themselves. Wildmon made this clear in a 2010 statement criticizing a Gay Pride parade that had a 10-year-old grand marshal.

“There is nothing about homosexual conduct to be proud of, and much to be ashamed of,” said Wildmon.

Family Research Council President Tony Perkins, who also signed the letter, is also not a fan of Gay Pride celebrations. He made this clear in a 2012 broadcast on the AFA’s radio network in which he implied being gay is similar to being an alcoholic or unfaithful to one’s spouse.

“The month of June is Gay Pride Month. Now, I have not yet seen where they have declared Adultery Pride Month, I have not seen where they have declared the Drunkenness Pride Month,” Perkins said. “Whether it’s adultery, whether it’s any type of sexual immorality it’s a problem, but we’re not celebrating those other forms as a society, we’re not promoting it and teaching it as normal in our schools.”

How kind!

The signatories of the letter have also blamed gays and lesbians for all sorts of societal ills. An 2012 “action alert” from the AFA said gays are damaging to your health.

“Homosexuality is a poor and dangerous choice, and has been proven to lead to a litany of health hazards to not only the individuals but also society as a whole,” the alert said.

Another AFA radio personality who signed the letter, Sandy Rios, used her time on the organization’s airwaves to blame gays and lesbians for all sorts of societal ills. In February 2012, she said gay friendly school programs were responsible for falling test scores.

“Whether they are teaching radical environmentalism or homosexuality. Can you imagine that they are teaching this instead of math and science? … That’s the reason our test scores are so shockingly low compared with the world.”

Just under nine months later, Rios upped the ante.

“They are clamoring for gay marriage,” said Rios of LGBT activists. “Of course it isn’t just gay marriage, it’s instruction, explicit instruction in public schools, it’s really I think the rape of our children’s innocence.”

Dobson, ever so kindly and politely, of course, managed to accuse LGBT activists of causing something even more dramatic than raping young minds — the total destruction of our world.

“Homosexuals are not monogamous. They want to destroy the institution of marriage, Dobson said at a 2004 rally in Oklahoma. “It will destroy marriage. It will destroy the Earth.”

The signatories have also accused gays and lesbians of wanting to attack American values. In March of this year, Wildmon said gay marriage could have a disastrous effect on the founding fathers’ vision for this country.

“Condoning sexual immorality and same-sex marriage may be a good way to make political friends, but it is diametrically opposed to the Word of God. The American Family Association is concerned more about the future of America and how moving away from God’s purpose and intent for marriage destroys the foundations of our Republic.”Â

Another signatory, Reverend Louis P. Sheldon, authored a book on the “homosexual plan to change America” in 2005 that described the gay “deathstyle” as being driven by angry, unpatriotic individuals.

“Men and women determined to undermine the American way of life have a profound hatred for the Christian values that made this nation great. They want not only to redefine the concept of family and normal sexual relationships but also to destroy the family as we know it, and they have said as much,” wrote Sheldon, “The promoters of the homosexual agenda are full of resentment and anger, mixed with self-loathing and shame, and they won’t stop until they have eradicated every trace of morality and self-restraint — unless by God’s grace we decide to rise up and say no and somehow put a stop to their desperate gambit.”

Perhaps the kindest words of all came from Bauer in 1999 after the Vermont Supreme Court ruled gay couples should have the same legal protections afforded to married couples.

“I think what the Vermont Supreme Court did last week was in some ways worse than terrorism,” Bauer said.